The MarketPlace application gives MasterCard users mobile access to weekday deals. The company partnered with Next Jump, an ecommerce company.

“We want to be where consumers are, in a format that they love,” said Melody Miller, group head of commerce solutions at MasterCard World, Purchase, NY. “We see this as a strategic way to extend our platform.

“We’re looking at several areas,” she said. “We’re seeing mobile as a channel to deliver value-end services.

“We have several other iPhone apps, making life easy for the consumer, as well as offers to the consumer.

MasterCard develops and markets payment services and provides analysis and consulting services to financial-institution customers and merchants.

Personalized shopping
The application is a personalized shopping platform with customized deals and offers from select merchants.

Cardholders can access the application and can get discounts of 50 percent off or more on products and services.

The offers are available in limited quantity and reservations are required – first-come, first-serve basis.

“We’re getting the word out about this by looking at the demographic of the users and leveraging the mass trends of social media,” Ms. Miller said. “We’re using Facebook, Twitter and YouTube.

Here is a screen grab of the application:

Mobile deals
Past deals include discounts for Apple iPods, Nintendo Wiis, Sephora products, Barnes & Noble’s nook eBook Reader and Macy’s and Converse products.

Consumers can save anywhere from $25-$100.

To reserve their spot for the daily deals, MasterCard cardholders must sign in. Those that do not have an account can sign up for free.

Users can also read full offer details of the deals.

Here is another screen grab of the application:

In addition, MasterCard has an ATM Hunter application for BlackBerry, giving users the ability to find the nearest ATM anywhere in the world.

The application is also available for Apple’s iPhone and iPod touch (see story).

“We’re looking to be where consumers are heading,” Ms. Miller said. “One of the key ways of the growing trend to ecommerce shopping is to extend into the mobile space.”

Final take
Rimma Kats, editorial assistant at Mobile Commerce Daily, New York.